HOSPITAL services across the region are facing an uncertain future due to a £500m ‘black hole’ in projected funding, according to a report released yesterday (Friday, August 26).

An investigation commissioned by campaign group 38 Degrees found that NHS trusts are drawing up plans to meet significant cuts in their budgets.

The analysis, carried out by health policy experts Incisive Health, reveals that there is a projected financial shortfall of £500m for NHS trusts in Durham, Darlington and Tees, Hambleton, Richmondshire and Whitby over the next five years.

The report also identifies that by 2021 the health and social care system in Northumberland and Tyne and Wear is projected to be £960m short of the funds it needs to balance its books while maintaining the same level of service.

Nationally there are measures in the pipeline such as proposals to close the equivalent of five wards in the Leeds Teaching Hospitals Trust and shutting an A&E department in the Midlands as trusts struggle to cope with a £23 billion national funding deficit.

Laura Townshend, director at 38 Degrees, said the public was being kept in the dark about how ‘dangerously underfunded’ the NHS is.

She added: “The NHS belongs to all of us - so local people in Durham, Darlington and Tees, Hambleton, Richmondshire and Whitby should get a say in any changes to their local services.

“That’s why hundreds of thousands of us have joined the 38 Degrees campaign calling for Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt to commit to full public disclosure of plans for each and every one of the 44 areas across England.”

Darlington MP Jenny Chapman said that she was concerned although unsurprised by the funding shortfalls.

She said: “This has been predicted for some time and it does heighten concern locally about our services.

“I have felt all along that financially-driven decisions were being disguised as clinical decisions.

“This is misleading to the public and we need full disclosure of the concerns of decision-makers so that we can campaign effectively as local citizens.”

The report will not reassure campaigners who already believe that the ongoing Better Health Programme currently examining how services can be delivered more effectively across County Durham and Teesside is anything other than a cost-cutting programme.

Health chiefs have previously stressed that any changes to services in the region will be made to improve the life chances and experience of patients and help hospitals meet clinical standards set by the government.

Commenting on the Incisive Health investigation, the Department of Health said it had protected the NHS "by giving it an extra £10 billion to fund its own plan to transform services".

A spokesman said: "Changes to local services will only go forward where they are designed by doctors and in the clear interests of local patients."

The Northern Echo contacted the Durham and Darlington and Hambleton, Richmondshire and Whitby Clinical Commissioning Groups, and South Tees NHS Trust for comment, but no-one was available at the time of going to press.